Vijayawada: Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy said there was a need to link the ‘Amma Vodi’ scheme to attendance of students in the schools from the academic year 2022 in the state.
Chairing a high-level review meet on schools and several schemes like Amma Vodi and Vidya Kanuka with the minister for education Adimulapu Suresh and top officials at his camp office here on Monday, the Chief Minister underlined the importance to bring about awareness among the students on the spirit of ‘Amma Vodi’ scheme as the government wanted every student to enrol in schools and pursue education. He said that though 75 per cent attendance was mandatory for the students to avail the Amma Vodi scheme, the government could not implement it in the wake of the prevalence of Coronavirus.
The Chief Minister said the Amma Vodi was launched in January, 2020 while the Covid-19 pandemic broke out in the last week of March, 2020 resulting in closure of schools for some time and added that once they were reopened in November, 2020, they resumed implementation of Amma Vodi in January, 2021, and as second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic started, they could not conduct annual exams and even delayed the reopening of schools from August 16 instead of regular June in 2021.
The Chief Minister directed the school education officials to implement the Amma Vodi scheme from the beginning of the ensuing academic year in 2022 by taking into consideration the mandatory 75 per cent attendance and also laid stress to implement Vidya Kanuka from June onwards.
The officials informed the Chief Minister that attendance of students in both the private and government schools was rising gradually as 73 per cent was registered in August, 82 per cent in September and 85 per cent in October so far and added that the attendance rose to 91 per cent especially in government schools in the state.
Reddy fixed a target for school education authorities to ensure all schools to CBSE affiliations and all the students to appear for CBSE exams by 2024 in the state and called for plans to arrange playgrounds in all schools beginning from high school to pre-schools in due course of time. The Chief Minister also asked the officials to keep Rs 1 lakh at the disposal of every school to help school authorities to take up regular repair works to the school buildings.
Meanwhile, the officials informed Reddy that they were planning to declare rankings to the schools based on their style of functioning through social audit. However, the Chief Minister directed them to talk to the teachers at the first instance to avoid any apprehensions on the issue and laid stress to involve them in such reforms in the schools. He called for vetting the school curriculum.
On Vidya Kanuka, the Chief Minister directed the officials to hand over such benefits to the students at the commencement of schools in the state. He asked the officials to bring about more awareness stating that the state government was not going to take over any aided schools unless their managements intended to do so and ruled out any forcible takeover of schools as it was a voluntary exercise.
